Hackable Robot Lawn Mower Unlocks a New Nightmare
Plus: Meta officially kills encrypted Instagram DMs, the Trump administration targets “violent left wing extremists,” leaked documents reveal Russia's school for elite hackers, and more.
The Guardian AI·
Claims of nimbyism are a misunderstanding: the movement is about whether regular people have a say in fundamental decisions Since the surreal scene at the 2024 presidential inauguration, when a row of big tech titans took their VIP seats and signaled their new alliance with Maga, the Trump administration has rolled out the red carpet for Silicon Valley’s AI ambitions and shareholder priorities. Washington has doled out billions in lucrative federal subsidies and contracts to the cash-rich sector, bloating an AI bubble that experts warn may imperil the entire economy while prohibiting any guardrails on the fast-moving technology. Continue reading...
Read full articlePlus: Meta officially kills encrypted Instagram DMs, the Trump administration targets “violent left wing extremists,” leaked documents reveal Russia's school for elite hackers, and more.
Artificial intelligence is no longer just a Silicon Valley debate: it’s becoming part of Africa’s creative revolution. In Nigeria, filmmakers and digital artists are experimenting with AI tools to create films, archive disappearing oral histories and imagine new African futures. Obinna Okere-keocha, founder of Naija Artificial Intelligence Film Festival, and filmmaker Malik Afegbua, use AI to preserve fading oral traditions by creating digital archives.
Massive new data centers are the physical foundation for tech companies’ hopes and dreams for AI. But the rush to expand warehouses full of energy-hungry servers has also kicked up fights across the world over their impact on power grids, utility bills, nearby communities, and the environment. From audacious plans to launch data centers into space to the latest legal battles over pollution, The Verge has the biggest news and reporting surrounding data centers. 43 percent of Americans blame data centers as a major reason for rising power bills. Senators are pushing to find out how much electricity data centers actually use How the spiraling Iran conflict could affect data centers and electricity costs Seven tech giants signed Trump’s pledge to keep electricity costs from spiking around data centers Trump claims tech companies will sign deals next week to pay for their own power supply Anthropic says it’ll try to keep its data centers from raising electricit
Silicon Valley oligarchs worried about the risks their technology posed to the world. They forgot about people.
AI is capable of mimicking a real person. It’s clear this capability exists, and the ethics of using AI for this purpose are often very clear. But increasingly, new applications are leading to ethically murky results. The good For example, the CEO of a company, or a politician, could choose to create a clone using AI tools, creating a chatbot plus an avatar — a digital twin — that can interact with people on their behalf. Silicon Valley is big on the idea: Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman are working on, or have already created, digital twins of themselves. Cloned politicians include Pakistan’s Imran Khan, who used an authorized voice clone to campaign from prison, and New York City Mayor Eric Adams, who used voice-cloned robocalls to speak with constituents in languages like Mandarin and Yiddish. This kind of use case is probably ethical — as long as the people interacting know that they’re dealing with a digital clone and not a real person. The bad The f
Silicon Valley giants have transformed from asset-light cash machines to huge infrastructure investors
World Liberty co-founder Zach Witkoff also said Thursday that the crypto firm is “in the final stages” of receiving bank charter approval from the Trump administration.
Today on Uncanny Valley, we’re diving into recent reports that the Trump administration is considering an executive order that would establish some sort of federal oversight over new AI models.